One of my biggest fears is deep water. I have always wondered why I’m so afraid of it. One time I was jet skiing in the Cayman Islands and I was cruising around within 50 yards of the shore. One of the boat captains had previously explained to me that about 200 yards off shore the depth of the water sharply dropped off from around 40 feet to a mile. A MILE DEEP. That is 5,280 feet, way deeper than 40! I decided to venture out and see what it was like to cross the “threshold” of depth. I revved my trusty Yamaha and went straight out toward the horizon. Suddenly, all around me, the water turned from light blue to black; I had journeyed over the great shelf. I was immediately filled with an ominous fear I had never experienced before (aside from when Taco Bell took the Volcano Taco off their menu). When I scampered back to safety and calmed down, I posed this question to myself: “Why is it that absolutely nothing changed when I crossed the barrier – my jet ski still worked perfectly, I had the same ability to swim, and the waves remained the same – but I was absolutely horror-stricken?” I researched the answer to this question for 3 solid years and have finally figured out the answer. In keeping with the TGM tradition, this is all totally scientific and full of completely accurate science.
I can’t believe I discovered this band at the Grammys. The Grammys is a 3.5 hour block of egos, actor slash “musicians”, and occasional mainstream country performances. Amiright? Yes, I am right and correct. But something happened two nights ago at the 53rd annual Grammy awards show that knocked me off my condescending elitist horse. I saw a band I’d never heard of before perform a song with such fervor that I was instantly drawn to them. And the song was very, very good. Too good. I thought there was a catch or something. But after two days of pondering, buying their album, and watching Youtube videos of their performances, I’m convinced they’re the real deal.
I oft face a conundrum with music in general, and that is: why do most of the “best” bands have dark & depressing, overly-political, or blatantly atheistic lyrics? There are of course exceptions to this rule, but they are too few and far between. I’m happy to report that Mumford & Sons have narrowed that gap just a little. Here is their refreshing Grammy performance of The Cave to start you off:
Hey everyone, remember The Gimcrack Miscellany? It’s my blog. You’re on it now, and you’re reading an article. Remember those days? I can’t quit you, TGM! Good old blogging… it is always there to bring me a hot cup of tea when I’m feeling down, and talk to me while I fall asleep.
I have talked before about how it feels like we live in the future because of all the awesome things we have, no? Maybe that’s one of my 27 drafts that are waiting to be finished. In any case – cell phones, man. How in the heck can we talk to whoever we want with no delay? Also – flat panel TVs, dude. Do you realize we are seeing a crystal clear, insanely bright, fifty-five inch wide, high resolution image on an apparatus that is less than an inch thick? That’s a far cry from the overhead projectors we had in school. Oh and – the Internet. Think about that one. You can carry around a sleek little netbook and have access to EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD from almost ANY PUBLIC PLACE.
I have said that to say this: you’d think that in a world with iPhones, organic LED TVs, and Internet everywhere, everything else would follow suit and get better and faster. You’d be wrong. I’m about to point out something in the following sentences that you’ve never consciously noticed, but has been driving you crazy. Sort of like when someone finally turns off a device that has been making a bunch of background noise all along and you suddenly realize how annoying it was once they turn it off.
There are a lot of differences between professional football, basketball, and baseball. We know that football is the best out of the three, and even though basketball sucks, there is no question that it is a distant runner up. That leaves baseball as the odd man out. I have been pondering why baseball sucks so bad. Just look at the outfield stands during baseball home run highlights. I challenge you to find a clip where the stands are actually full. Usually, there aren’t even any fans in those stands. In fact, take a look at the following informative maps which show the distribution of baseball, basketball, and football fans in America:
Certain things stand the test of time. To name a few: The Beatles, Seinfeld, original Star Wars, and hhhhwhiskey. The question I want to ask, right here, right now, is hhhhwhy? Why do some things stand the test of time no matter how widespread they become, yet other things get real old, real quick? I think it is because of the quality of the product. The more time, energy, and skill that goes into producing something, the longer it will stick around (duh). But what is a concrete sign that something was made with a higher skill level?
The answer is discretion. Too much of anything is not a good thing, and it usually ends up ruining a product. If you put too much of any one ingredient in a recipe, you ruin the recipe. Refer to the previous examples I gave, and you will see that they definitely follow this important guideline because they have been built with intentional discretion. Everyone loves Newman from Seinfeld, but he actually plays a very minor role. This is because the creators wanted you to get excited when you finally did see him, which made people want to watch the show. In a sense, it makes the show sort of feel fresh and always new.
Seriously, moviegoers?! You liked Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen?
There are two explanations for the way I feel about the downward-sloping overall quality of movies over the past few years. 1) I am getting older and my taste has become more refined, or 2) greed has ruined the movie industry by encouraging quantity over quality. Seeing as how my favorite cuisine is Taco Bell, I own a Nick Lachey album, and prefer Miller Lite when it comes to beers, the first explanation has to be impossible.
So, it’s greed. Greedy movie studio executives (is that redundant?) are buying up film rights to old cartoon franchises faster than Grand Theft Auto fanboys were buying San Andreas before it was pulled from the shelves in 2005. However, placing the blame for terrible movies on film execs is like blaming GM for the decline of domestic automobiles. Film execs represent a corporation, which exists solely to make money. They will do whatever they can get away with to cause consumers (which in the case of GM includes the government) to spend money on their product. While it is because of filmmakers that films are terrible, it is not their fault. The blame should be placed on the American consumer. You. It is your fault.
Remember that broad who Kissed A Girl? Also remember that girl from The Happening? Well if you haven’t figured it out by now, they look exactly alike. And I’m the first one who pointed it out.
Click this post to play a little game where I’ve included a picture of each person and labeled them A and B. Your job is to figure out which is which. This is a new type of game semantic that I’ve created which you have probably never seen before, so if you get confused just read the comments.
It is sad that this post is the reason my blog has had so many visits over the last year. Whoa whoa, hold on there. I didn’t say I regret writing it.
The tallest structure ever built is complete. The Burj Dubai has been under construction since 2004, located in Dubai, UAE (that’s in the Middle East if you don’t know). It is one of the most beautiful buildings I’ve ever seen, in one of the most beautiful cities (structurally) I’ve ever seen. It is 2,684 feet tall with 160 floors, and it’s GIGANTIC. The record for tallest skyskraper in the world has been broken several times recently, but the Burj Dubai not only broke the record, it broke the record for how much a record was broken by. To give you an idea of how tall this building is, let me show you some images and compare it with other supertall buildings.
Did you know a gaggle only refers to geese on the ground? In the air they’re referred to as a skein. I don’t know why I told you that. Maybe you should Twitter it you twidiot1. I don’t always have time to Berate a movie after I’ve seen it because I have a job and a wife and there’s beer to be drunk and I’m too busy retweeting about Conan episodes that make fun of Twitter. J/k, what is a retweet? Is it something? Because I think I’ve heard of it. So I’ve decided that I still want to have a record of my reaction to movies I’ve seen even if I don’t have the time to write a full Berating, and in doing so I have made up my second new word of this blog post: Briefratings2. And you’re about to get a gaggle of them and agree with everything I write as usual. (I’ll do whatever I have to do to get you to comment on TGM).
District 9 is one of those rare gems where the cast is made up of entirely unknowns, directed by an unknown, and set in an unknown place (there’s a city in South Africa with buildings? is South Africa like a country or something? more ignorant questions). That’s why it’s such a good movie. It’s like Star Wars IV or Cloverfield or Napoleon Dynamite. I guess what I’m saying is it can only go down from here. So let’s all enjoy this movie while we still can. Everyone go out and see this movie and support directors that make special effects who are not Micheal Bay. Do it for the children.
This is today’s Penny Arcade comic strip. It is probably one of my favorite PA’s of all time. So simple. So Poignant. There should be another panel with Rorschach from Watchmen stalking Batman stalking the Splinter Cell guy stalking the goon, and then even one more panel after that with Chuck Norris stalking Rorschach. Whoa. [...]
Twitter is a black hole. It is a singularity event. And it has been scientifically proven. I realize the image I made doesn’t make sense because the Twitter bird should be the actual black hole, not being sucked into it. So? Why don’t you go tweet about it.
This study done by Pear Analytics shows that most Twitter Tweets are meaningless and have no pass-along value. In fact, 40.5% of Tweets are classified as “Pointless Babble”, which is what I hate most about Twitter. “I just woke up and it’s raining outside.” Well whoopty-freaking-do. Tweeting something like that means only one of two things (ashasbeendiscussedquitefrequentlyatTGMbefore – lol): 1) you have no real friends to tell, or 2) your ego is so big that you think people actually care.
So how is Twitter a black hole? You’re about to find out.
Thursday, September 10th, at 8:30PM the Titans and Steelers will open the 2009 NFL season. I have embedded a convenient countdown timer for your benefit. Except I couldn’t put in a time so it’s counting down to midnight of September 9th. Close enough.
Around this time every year I usually do a blog post to get us hyped up for football season. For the 2007 season I posted an awesome Nike commercial that gets you hyped up no matter what. For the 2008 season I posted a funny Jim Mora commercial that will make you laugh as well as get you hyped up no matter what. Sometimes I even do it mid-year, like in December 2007 when I hit you with a post with awesome NFL photos which is guaranteed to make you wish you played in the NFL and also get you hyped up no matter what.
This year I have been inspired by the sound of music. I have obtained samples of all the various NFL themes. You will be surprised at how many of these you know, and how you didn’t realize they were actually different songs. Even if you’re a girl, or are not a football fan, or both, I guarantee you will recognize 90% of these themes. You won’t know how, but you’ll recognize them, I promise.
I know a girl who is probably going to read this and probably going to get upset with me because she is probably the #1 fan of Twilight ever. You know who you are. Look on the bright side, you got mentioned on TGM! You are now in the company of Katy Perry, Micheal Bay, Bill Bellichick, and Twitter. Except the difference is I hate all of them and I love you like a sister. Man, all I had to do was come up with this simple simple simple idea and I could have been on the front page of Digg today:
Chad Johnson or Ocho-Cinco or Blond-Fauxhawk wants to Tweet during NFL games. Apparently he has run out of things to distract him from actually playing good football: changing his name, dogging his teammates, doing dances in the end-zone, sporting a blond mohawk, pouring popcorn into his mouth through his helmet on the sidelines (or was that T.O?), etc. I think he should focus on scoring more than 4 measly touchdowns this season. Chad Johnson my friend you have just been burned by the eternal flame of TGM.
Isn’t it crazy how many people have died recently? I’m talking about famous people, who are worth at least 10 regular people. The recent events remind me of not one but two separate topics I have previously written about in this blog. The first is obviously Reference Burst Theory where celebrities die in threes, because within two days Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and Micheal Jackson died (some would say there was a second wave with Billy Mays, Karl Maldon, and Steve McNair). But the second topic is what I would call your attention to now, and that’s the idea of people becoming proverbial saints upon death, which I touched on in my award-winning blog post entitled “Alive One Minute, Saint The Next” written in November 2007. Seriously, Everyone On Earth?! This Micheal Jackson stuff is getting ridiculous. That’s the end of this article so there’s no reason to click the title, sorry.
Michael Bay is a 15 year old boy trapped in a man’s body (and in the ’90s). He gets older, his movies stay the same age. I don’t know why I keep seeing his movies. I guess it is because when I was 15 I saw The Rock and it rocked (sorry) my 15-year-old little brain that desired nothing but violence/sex/wreckage/fast cars and had no time for character development, real-life situations, or dialogue. At the risk of sounding pretentious, Revenge of the Fallen is for one of two groups: A) 15 year old boys (or anyone with the mental capacity of a 15 year old boy), and B) people who are willing to forgo their dignity to publicly oggle over Megan Fox and Isabel Lucas for 2 hours (actually this is just another way of describing group A).
If you refer to the image I have conveniently included above, you will see a snapshot of exactly what this movie is: Shia is intense and scared, Megan is slightly less intense and scared and her breasts are half exposed, and they are surrounded by wreckage and GM cars. If that is what you want out of life then GO SEE THIS MOVIE RIGHT NOW WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR! Also when you’re done seeing Transformers rent the movie Idiocracy and tell me if you “get it” or not. You won’t.
